Augmented State Of The Union

Tonight is President Obama’s second State of the Union address before Congress and the American People.  There has been no shortage of talk about civility (as signified by Republicans and Democrats intermingling on the House floor), and speculation about what the President will talk about (jobs), and in just a few hours we will see what it amounts to. It is interesting that as technology has advanced so far beyond television, television is how most people who watch the state of the union will experience it.  There will be plenty of punditry before and after.  But this year, thanks to the Sunlight Foundation, there will be a new way to experience of the State of the Union. Sunlight is presenting The State Of The Union on Sunlight Live where reporters, watchdogs and other experts will provide real time analysis and contextualization of what the President is saying. From their announcement: We’ll be joining forces with the Huffington Post, Center for Public Integrity, National Journal and CQ Roll Call to cover the live speech and the Republican response, starting at 8:30 PM EST.  Combining live streaming video, real-time blogging, government transparency data and social media coverage, we’ll provide insight and context to the proposals, people and policies mentioned during the speech. I’m excited to have this new experience — the Augmented State Of The Union — and interested to see how this technology — real time analysis overlayed on the event– effects my perception of the speech.  I am also interested in what the prospect of this style of reporting might do to speechmaking in the future.  We have all...

NTEN Webinar: Are You An Accidental Product Owner or Project Manager?

Are you an Accidental Project Manager or Product Owner? Have you been given a product or service to deliver and been tossed in the deep end? Do you know what a Project Manager or Product Owner is or is supposed to do? We are super excited to be presenting a Webinar with NTEN to help people who have found themselves in this very situation. Sadie Honey and Elizabeth Raley will co-present the session on Wednesday, January 26th at 11AM (PST).  They will de-mystify the vocabulary and help you understand how to get your project or product out the door. In addition, Elizabeth and Sadie will discuss the overlapping roles of the traditional Project Manager vs the Product Owner role in Scrum, an agile approach to managing complex projects. During this webinar, you’ll learn: Understanding of the vocabulary of project management Step by step process to follow Two easy-to-use templates Learn More & Register Learn more about this webinar and NTEN or Register for this webinar today! Registration is $35 for NTEN Members, $70 for non-members....

Support The NTC Scholarship Fund, Buy A Song From Ian Rhett

Each year NTEN raises money to provide scholarships to staff from nonprofit organization that would otherwise not be able to afford to attend the conference.  Usually the money is raised by people and companies sponsoring or donating money with the reward of seeing Holly Ross, and other N-NTEN staff do something funny, like singing and dancing to All The Single Ladies. This year, NTEN has organized an auction, where people and companies are donating a product, or service and others can bid on these items.  We are offering our own Ian Rhett’s talents to craft a song which could be performed recorded or live for an organization or individual. It could be a ballad about nonprofit technology, a serenade of your Executive Director, or the N-TEN Staff, or song about an issue near and dear to your heart, or your organization. Here is an example of Ian’s handy work with a song about Drupal and you can find more of Ian’s music videos on YouTube and learn more about his music on his website. The NTC is a fantastic conference that affords nonprofit groups an opportunity to learn from each other and meet experts in the field of nonprofit technology from web strategy, to hardware and IT and everything in the middle.  This year we are excited to be a sponsor and to help organize the Ignite reception are March 17th, and to also be the Power Up sponsor of power strips and a power check table. A word of note about the auction: you must register with Allthis.com to bid on the...

Ignite NTC 2011 Call For Proposals

CivicActions is tremendously excited for the 2011 Nonprofit Technology Conference (11NTC). We are sponsoring the conference in two ways this year: we will be the sponsors of the Ignite Reception on March 17th, and we are sponsoring power strips throughout the conference as well as a “Power Check” — think of it like a coat check with electricity for your devices. We have at least one other surprise for NTC, so stay tuned. Ignite is a style of presentation inspired by Pecha Kucha where: Participants have five minutes to speak on a subject, accompanied by 20 slides. Each slide is displayed for 15 seconds. Slides are automatically advanced. Speakers do not have notes. Ignite is not a five minute sales pitch. Ignite’s motto: Enlighten Us, But Make It Quick. If you’ve got a passion that you can’t wait to share, check out this video, and then submit an application by February 21!   NTC Ignite Details: February 21: Ignite Application Deadline February 28: Ignite Applicants Notified March 10: Ignite Presentation Slides Due Some Ignite History The first Ignite event was held in 2006 in Seattle, Washington, sponsored by O’Reilly and MAKE magazine. O’Reilly has continued to support Ignite but each Ignite is independently organized at the local level. Ignite events take place in hundreds of cities each year, you can view videos of some of the best Ignite talks at http://igniteshow.com. You can also subscribe to the Ignite Podcast on iTunes. Global Ignite week will be February 7-11, 2011 with events in over 100 cities! This will be the third year of Ignite at the NTC, last year, Ian...

CivicActions Proud To Sponsor CiviCRM CiviCON 2011 In Chicago

We are proud to once again be sponsors of CiviCON, the annual conference for CiviCRM implementers and developers.  Last year’s conference was held in conjunction with DrupalCon in San Francisco, and this year’s will precede  DrupalCon in Chicago (which we are also sponsoring).  CivicActions is not only a Gold Sponsor of CiviCON we are also helping out with some of the organizing of it. CiviCON is a fantastic opportunity to not only share what we have learned working with CiviCRM for the last five years, but to also learn from others working with the software, help steer the direction of development and look for new, talented developers and implementers to join our team. In fact, last year we met some CiviCRM experts we have since collaborated with. Sponsoring CiviCON is important to CivicActions because the conference is an important opportunity for the CiviCRM community to come together to discuss the software and its future. The value of CiviCON far exceeds the cost to produce the event. I’ve been working with Dave Greenberg and the folks at CiviCRM to develop the sponsorship program for this year’s conference.  We are looking for 22 sponsors total at levels from $250 to $1500.  If your company works with CiviCRM not only should you consider attending the conference, you should sponsor it.  CiviCON provides an opportunity for leaders in the CiviCRM community to come together, share, plan, and advance the software. Sponsoring CiviCON is also a good way to market your business, or organization.  Even if you are an individual who deploys CiviCRM for your clients, the Bronze level sponsorship ($250) is a fantastic way...